Category: Comics

I don’t draw fan art much, but a recent trip to a figure drawing class made me realize I could use some practice. What better way to practice than to draw your favorite characters in different styles? Thus I present to you two drastically different takes on Mega Man AKA Rockman AKA whatever you prefer to call him.

The first is Mega Man X sporting a power-up that would make Dr. Wily smash his beakers in frustration: Arthur’s armor from Ghosts ‘n Goblins.

Of course, it could be just as bad for Mega Man if this means one hit’ll put him in underoos only.

The next takes the loathsome Mega Man US box art and spins it in the style of mangaka Buichi Terasawa (Space Adventure Cobra). Ok, now he looks cool. And he smokes.

I have a version of this with a background over at the subhumanzoids tumblr, but I thought this one went better with this post.

It’s Halloween! The best day of the year! I’ve been watching a lot of horror movies, per usual. Some of the highlight’s of this year’s marathon include The People Under the Stairs, Phantasm II, Dagon, Dead & Buried and Inferno, among others. Zombi is playing this Saturday at the Landmark Sunshine (awesome theater) in NYC, so I’ll see if I can drag a hapless maniac or two to watch that with me.

Also, in celebration of the season, I finally got my The Drifting Classroom chiptune concept album back online. It had been hosted at Beep City since its original release in 2009, but the site has since been put into the ground like a good corpse.

Now it’s BACK on its very own bandcamp page, where I’ll eventually be uploading my other chiptune albums, as well. I recommend it, mostly because I did it, but I’m also still really proud of the way it turned out. When I made it I was right in the middle of reading Viz Media’s release of The Drifting Classroom manga in its entirety, so this is very much the kind of stuff that was going through my head musically while reading Kazuo Umezu’s otherworldly horrors. It’s a bit mental, as a result, and I’d have it no other way.

Best of all, it’s FREE! But hey, you don’t have to take my word for it. Back when it was released, one of the fine mensches at the Tokyo Scum Brigade blog actually brought a physical copy of the album to KAZUO UMEZU himself, where it was met with his appropriately GWASH! style of approval.

Remember when I posted about the distinct mental illness that was brought on by my obsession with Game Center CX? It’s not well documented, but it is documented nonetheless. Frankly, though, those games are just cruddy old Japanese plastic without a TV GAMIN’ machine with which to jam ’em, and a few weeks ago I finally bit the bullet.

CAUTION: Those faint of heart will want to click away now. Anywhere will do, just get far, far away from this crippling contagion.

Yes, there it is. A “family computer” in every sense of the word. Marvel at its bleeding display on my too-advanced TV, set to channel 95 which is literally where no modern television set has gone before. The Famicom came with a stack of loose carts, including Super Mario Bros., Seicross, Final Fantasy III and Excitebike.

As you’ll see below, a true Japanese celebrity owned the FFIII cart before me.

Hard Gay! フ～～～～～～～！

Of all the games I got, however, I developed an instant, inexplicable obsession with Seicross, which is a pretty bland but oddly addictive future bike action game.

Barely visible on the left, my fuel for these grueling endeavors… a cup o’ soda courtesy CLUCK U CHICKEN!

Back when I was part of the amazing Robotronic Dynamite podcast (R.I.P.), we treated October like the month-long celebration of Halloween it’s meant to be. Thanks to what mostly amounted to the hard work of Brandon Fincher, we had a couple years in a row that aimed a white hot spooky spotlight on our very own Halloween music compilations, Too Ghoul for School.

In the spirit of the season, I’ve resurrected both volumes from the dead. The track lists are staggering (39 and 46 tracks, respectively) and cover pretty much all the bases. I STILL listen to these annually, so they’re definitely worth preserving.

Too Ghoul for School vol. 1 (177.8mb .zip)

1. The Ghastly Ones – Invitation 0:34
2. The Ghastly Ones – Diabolo’s Theme 2:10
3. Bernard Herrmann – The Twilight Zone (Main Theme) 0:31
4. Ramones – Chain Saw 1:57
5. Radio Spot – Triple Terror Show ad 2 0:28
6. Oingo Boingo – Dead Man’s Party 6:22
7. Fantômas – Rosemary’s Baby 3:21
8. B.A. Robertson – Sucker For Your Love 3:08
9. The Birthday Party – Deep in the Woods 4:46
10. The Advantage – Ghosts ‘n’ Goblins (Intro) 0:05
11. The Advantage – Ghosts ‘n’ Goblins 1:08
12. RJD2 – The Horror 4:12
13. Radio Spot – Bloody Pit Of Horror 1:14
14. Dead Kennedys – Halloween 3:35
15. HIM – (Don’t Fear) The Reaper 6:26
16. John Carpenter – Empty Street (From Halloween) 0:33
17. Henry Rollins – Ghost Rider 2:28
18. Donald Rubenstein – Tales From The Darkside 1:02
19. The Dickies – Killer Klowns 4:35
20. Radio Spot – Last House On The Left 0:35
21. Samhain – To Walk the Night 2:13
22. David Bowie – Scary Monsters (and Super Creeps) 5:13
23. Goblin – Profondo Rosso (Re-Mix) 5:15
24. Iron Maiden – Fear Of The Dark 7:16
25. The Misfits – Ghoul’s Night Out 1:58
26. Night of The Living Dead (excerpt) – All Messed Up 0:59
27. Tom Waits – The Earth Died Screaming 3:39
28. Talking Heads – Psycho Killer 4:22
29. John Harrison – Prologue (Welcome To Creepshow ) 4:07
30. Konami – Prologue (Start BGM From Castlevania) 0:10
31. Donald Rubenstein – Halloween 1:27
32. Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds – The Curse of Millhaven 6:55
33. The Robert Corbet Orchestra – Dark Shadows 1:12
34. Radio Spot – Dr. Tarr’s Torture Dungeon ad 0:27
35. The Damned – Dead Beat Dance 3:51
36. Fred Mollin – Friday The 13th: The Series (Main Title) 0:57
37. Type O Negative – All Hallows Eve 8:36
38. Radio Spot – Horror of the Zombies 0:29
39. Tommy Lee Wallace – Halloween Montage (From Halloween 3) 1:39

Too Ghoul for School vol. 2 (188.5mb .zip)

1. Intro / Fabio Frizzi – Verso L’Ignoto (The Beyond)
2. The Birthday Party – Release The Bats
3. Iron Maiden – Murders In The Rue Morgue
4. Blood Mania Radio Spot
5. Ramones – Pet Semetary
6. Friday The 13th NES soundtrack
7. Dj Jazzy Jeff & The Fresh Prince – Nightmare On My Street
8. Basket Case Radio Spot
9. Alien Sex Fiend – Dead And Buried
10. The B-52’s – Devil In My Car
11. The Hearse – Radio Spot
12. Silent Hill 2 – Promise (reprise)
13. The Dead Boys – Dead and Alive
14. Dawn of The Dead – Radio Spot
15. Werewolves On Wheels – Radio Spot
16. The Ghastly Ones – Werewolves On Wheels
17. Cat Power – Werewolf
18. Goblin – Tenebre
19. Castlevania (SoTN – Requiem For The Gods)
20. Horror of The Zombies – Radio Spot
21. Shadowgate NES – Title
22. Astro Zombies – Radio Spot
23. Future Bible Heroes – I’m a vampire
24. Vampire Playgirls Radio Spot
25. Zombies Ate My Neighbors SNES – Weird Kids On The Block
26. Fred Myrow & Malcolm Seagrave – Intro & Main Title (Phantasm)
27. Phantasm Radio Spot
28. Evile – Killer From The Deep
29. Humanoids From The Deep Radio Spot
30. Otis Redding – Trick or Treat
31. Donovan – Seasons of The Witch
32. Splatterhouse 3 – Opening Theme
33. John Lennon – Scared
34. Uninvited NES – Daylight
35. Mark of The Devil Radio Spot
36. Geto Boys – My Mind’s Playing Tricks On Me
37. Tom Petty – Zombie Zoo
38. Zombie Radio Spot
39. Chad VanGaalen – Molten Light
40. The Sonics – The Witch
41. Gravediggaz – Diary of A Madman
42. Blackula – Radio Spot
43. Gein & The Graverobbers – Haunted House
44. Matt Nida – Flesheaters
45. Graveyard Tramps – Radio Spot
46. The Creepshow – Dearly Departed / Outro

When Kotaku started streaming Game Center CX as Retro Game Master, the dam finally broke. I went from “I can watch this series at last” to “complete maniac downloading every fan-subbed episode available” in no time flat, and I haven’t looked back since. Fact of the matter is, there’s a special kind of magic to Shinya Arino’s show, something I went into greater detail about here, and would much rather link than rehash.

Because the point of this post is more the dangerous sickness the show spurred; something that went way beyond simply spending time watching it and forcing it on other people. No, this is a sickness that has wallet-based repercussions. See the evidence below, and if your brain happens to be as vilely corrupted as mine, you can click to enlarge that which you covet so perversely.

It started with the above, Atlantis no Nazo (The Mystery of Atlantis), which I thought would just be cool to get because it was complete, relatively cheap, and featured in one of the early episodes of GCCX. Of course, holding something as rad as a boxed Famicom game can only lead to more trouble, and the floodgates were officially open.

Next in line was Gradius, because, hey, who doesn’t want to play Gradius? Totally justifiable. But then…

What the hell? Seriously? Yeah, I mostly got this one because it was cheap and Akira Toriyama’s art is rad. NO APOLOGIES. NO TURNING BACK.

This one no doubt makes up for any prior errors in judgment. Just look at that sexy cart. That thick manual! Totally makes you want to drain your PayPal account all over the place, doesn’t it?